POTTSTOWN — A man who apparently did not understand that comments at borough council meetings are to be made at the beginning was shut down Tuesday night by Borough Council President Stephen Toroney and plain clothes police as he tried to comment on the appointment of Mark Flanders as the new borough manager.

Waiting until a motion and second had been made for Flanders’ appointment, an elderly man in the back of the room, said he had a question on the matter.

But Toroney told him “this is a public meeting and comments are to be made at the beginning of the meeting.”

“How are you supposed to comment when you don’t know what’s going to happen?” asked a woman in the audience.

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The speaker, who did not identify himself and who indicated he had been under the impression the meetings were run under “Robert’s Rules of Order,” continued to speak.

“Why would you appoint the chief?” he could be heard to say as Toroney spoke over him: “I would request your courteousness as to the process of this meeting.”

In addition to serving as interim borough manager since July, Flanders is also Pottstown’s police chief, a post he will continue to hold until April.

As the man in the audience said “you want to table the truth,” several police officers in plain clothes got up and asked the man to “settle down” and to “sit down.”

The officers and the speaker left the meeting room before the meeting was concluded.

In fact many audience members left as soon as the vote on Flanders’ appointment had been completed.

Police Captain Rick Drumheller said he asked the officers to be present.

“I thought there might be some disgruntled members of the audience,” Drumheller said.

The officers were members of the Community Response Unit and were not dressed in uniform on purpose, he said.

“They would blend in better with the crowd that way and if there was no trouble, they would just be people sitting in the audience,” Drumheller said.